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"It's time now that the people rejoice. The City Council has finally voted and this mayor has voted to do what we had asked them to do last November, and that was to honor the will of the people and to take down these cameras," said Michael Kubosh, an organizer of the red-light camera ballot initiative.

With the politicians done, the lawyers take over.

ATS indicated it immediately will go to court to fight the shut-off of the cameras, and then pursue as much as $25 million from the city for breaching its contract that runs through May 2014.

"Houston has always enjoyed for decades a great business reputation where a deal is a deal. In the courthouse they call that the sanctity of contract. Today, the City Council tarnished the reputation of the city by throwing out a valid agreement with our company," ATS attorney Andy Taylor said. "As a result of throwing it out, it's going to make the streets of Houston less safe, and it's also going to open up, I'm sad to say, the taxpayers to liability to the tune of millions of dollars."

$25 million unpaid?

The city is not granting amnesty to those who received notices of violation from the inception of the program in September 2006 through the vote last November and then from the restart of the program on July 24 through Wednesday. More than 265,000 notices worth about $25 million remain unpaid, according to city officials.

"In the event there is any award to ATS, this is the money that would be used to pay that award, and it's only fitting that it should be paid by people who run red lights," City Attorney David Feldman said.

In the last two weeks Feldman has filed 55 lawsuits against serial violators. Feldman said the city also has the authority to report to credit bureaus unpaid violations, which do not go on violators' driving record nor subject them to arrest because they are civil penalties.

In a year in which the city cut $100 million in spending, laid off 747 employees, redrew its political map, set off bitter property rights disputes by designating several neighborhoods as historic and implemented a new monthly fee to pay for billions of dollars in drainage infrastructure, the red-light cameras have been City Hall's cause celebre.

The mayor has tried to walk a fine line on the issue, seeking to protect the city from legal liability while honoring the will of the voters. She deferred to the November mandate even though she repeatedly acknowledged that she did not agree with it. And she came under fire for her on-again, off-again orders.

Mayor took heat

Shortly after last November's vote, Parker ordered the cameras turned off. Then in June, a federal judge declared the election invalid because the ballot petition drive was years beyond the deadline for citizen challenges to city ordinances. Fearing huge liability, Parker ordered the cameras back on last month. When ATS demanded $18 million to settle the contract dispute - a demand that ATS officials say the city ordered it to submit against its will - Parker declared on Aug. 13 that the company was not negotiating in good faith and brought the shutoff resolution and ordinance to the council.

Although the mayor has denied any political motive in shutting off the cameras again less than nine weeks before the start of early voting in city elections, she said during Wednesday's council debate, "I've been a piñata out there for months and months on this."

After unilaterally ordering the cameras turned on last month, the mayor sought Council's support to turn them off again.

"She doesn't want to be alone with this mess," Councilman Al Hoang said after the meeting. Nor should she have to be, he said. "We have to share all the responsibilities together."

Several council members hailed the vote as honoring the will of the people.

Councilwoman Sue Lovell stood alone in voting against an end to the cameras. She also tried unsuccessfully to delay their shut-off by offering an amendment that would codify an offer ATS general counsel George Hittner made to council Tuesday: Keep the cameras on through the end of 2013 - shortening the contract by five months - and ATS would forgive all damages.

Lovell remained a diehard supporter of the cameras, convinced that they save lives.

"We've walked away today with nothing, nothing in place to keep you (local motorists) safe," she said. "I don't know how we're going to protect the citizens."

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